Correlation of regional brain metabolism with receptor localization during ketamine anesthesia: combined autoradiographic 2-[3H]deoxy-D-glucose receptor binding technique.

LKB film autoradiography of 2-]3H]deoxy-D-glucose uptake shows that ketamine, administered in anesthetic doses, alters the pattern of metabolic activity in rat hippocampus. The labeled metabolic marker can be washed out of the slide-mounted tissue sections by preincubation to permit in vitro autoradiography of drug and neurotransmitter receptors in the same animal. In this way, opiate and phencyclidine receptor distributions may be correlated with patterns of glucose utilization in adjacent sections. If the observed relative enhancement of 2-deoxy-D-glucose uptake in the stratum moleculare of hippocampus reflects elevated metabolism in nerve terminals there, then the binding of ketamine to phencyclidine receptors on neurons in distant afferent sites, such as entorhinal cortex, may initiate the physiologic and metabolic effects.     

Ranitidine improves postoperative suppression of antibody response to preoperative vaccination.

The effect of the histamine-2 receptor antagonist ranitidine (100 mg intravenously every 12 hours for 72 hours) on postoperative serum antibody responses to preoperative immunization with six limit of flocculation tetanus toxoid and six limit of flocculation diphtheria toxoid was assessed in a double-blind, placebo-controlled randomized study in 26 patients undergoing major abdominal surgery. The preoperative antitetanus antibody level was less than 0.1 IU/ml in all patients, and they were inoculated with both antigens 48 hours before surgery. Serum samples for analysis of antitetanus toxoid and antidiphtheria toxoid were drawn before skin incision and on postoperative days 1, 3, 5, 7, 10, 14, 21, and 28. Ranitidine significantly increased the postoperative antibody response to tetanus toxoid, (p less than 0.01) and insignificantly increased that to diphtheria toxoid vaccination (p less than 0.2) compared with placebo.     

Early body mass index and other anthropometric relationships between parents and children.

OBJECTIVE: To assess longitudinally the relationship between measures of adiposity in children over the first 8 y of life with that of their parents and to explore the role of parental adiposity in the development of childhood adiposity. DESIGN: Longitudinal study of measures of adiposity in children. SUBJECTS: A community sample from three health service systems including 114 children followed annually from infancy to age 8 and their 228 biological parents. METHODS: Measurements were assessed at baseline for parents (6 months post-partum for mothers) and at regular intervals for children beginning at age 2 months. Measurements included weight, height, triceps skinfold, subscapular skinfold, midarm circumference, waist and hip. RESULTS: The major findings were: (1) significant correlations between parental body mass index (BMI), both maternal and paternal, and their biological offspring first emerged at age 7; (2) children with two overweight parents had consistently elevated BMI compared to children with either no overweight parents or one overweight parent. These differences became significant beginning at age 7. CONCLUSIONS: This study supports the hypothesis that familial factors (biological and/or environmental) affecting the development of adiposity emerge at specific ages and are related to the adiposity of both parents.     

The effect of intraocular dilating solution on cat endothelium

Maintenance of pupillary dilatation can be a difficult problem. We found a dilute intraocular solution of atropine and epinephrine to be both effective and safe in inducing pupillary dilatation. No significant corneal endothelial toxicity could be demonstrated in the cat eye comparing preinjection and postinjection endothelial cell density.     

Antibodies against defined nerve cell components: gangliosides

Antisera have been raised in rabbits against the purified brain gangliosides GM₁, GD_1a and GT_1b. The reactivity of these sera with a range of purified gangliosides has been examined by complement fixation and their specificities partially defined by absorptions with purified gangliosides.